Friday, April 10, 2015

My Collection (X): Xena's Leather Scabbard (Made by me)

Hey everybody!

I promised on my Facebook page that I'd take good photos of the Xena leather scabbard I made, and here they are! For clarity's sake, this is not either the scabbard reproduction made by Creation Entertainment nor Todd's Costumes, but a replica 100% done by me.

For some reason Xena's scabbard is a favorite piece of mine -and given I couldn't find one as screen accurate as I wanted I decided to make it myself.

Let's take a closer look!

Front and Back of the scabbard.

Perspective shots of the Front and Back.

The scabbard is composed by 3 things (or groups of things):

- The Core: made by XPS or extruded polystyrene foam, as I believe the original props were made of as well.

- The Covering: that is the leather itself. I used real cow leather, in a very specific chocolate hue (Xena's trademark color) that looks brown or black depending the light. it was quite challenging to find! The thickness had to be precise too, as a thiner leather would have looked wrong, while a thicker one would have been impossible to bend.

- The Appliances: brooches, rivets and hooks. The golden brooches are made in resin and painted gold -and are made exactly after the ones in the prop. The hooks are brass, and with these I took some small liberties to achieve what I considered the best look possible.

As some of you requested, I've also taken some pics of the scabbard alongside my Creation Ent Xena sword replica. I think they match, right? :)

The leather has been carefully treated with several tools and products (sandpaper, alcohol, acetone, baby powder, show polish...to name some) in order to achieve the right battle-worn and aged look any Xena scabbard should have -more visible in the following close-ups.

Close-up to the top of the scabbard.

Close-up to the middle of the scabbard.

Close-up to the tip of the scabbard.

Longitudinal angled shot of the sword and scabbard.

The tricky thing about the scabbard is that although it might not be the most difficult piece to make all the details have to be perfect to get the right effect. Shape, material, color, finish... It took me some tries to get them all right. It was a long process at times, but I think the result is totally worth it.

This is the blueprint I made - a little "present" that I hope you will like!

My blueprints to make the leather scabbard.

Apart from thousands of screen caps, my biggest inspiration (for the blueprints and for the making process itself) has been the Xena scabbard prop found at the Te Papa Museum collection at New Zealand.

About me

My chakrams

Here both my Creation Ent chakrams, out of their shadowboxes :)

Welcome to my blog! :)

Hello! I'm Secret Kabeiros! Welcome to my little Xena spot :) I collect, buy and trade Xena props and replicas, above all iconic stuff that belonged to the main characters in their classical outfits. I also help other collectors by putting them in contact and interconnecting them with other buyers, sellers and traders.

I know there are many other Xena pages around, but here I'll try to update as often as possible to show what's cooking around the Xena prop world!